Reading and writing one's way into language awareness

This paper examines the subprocesses of reading, as they have been identified in L1 and L2 reading research, and the two types of input that they require; the data from the text, on the one hand, and the data that the learner has stored, on the other. It argues that through activities designed to work with each one of the subprocesses in turn, attention can be focused both on the subprocess itself and on the language data used by it, and that language awareness is thereby developed. A set of activities, designed in such a way as to match each of the subprocesses of reading, is linked to a sample text in English. It is argued that when readers carry out these activities, whether the text is L1 or L2 for them, an awareness both of the language data and of the different subprocesses of reading ensues. When the text is in L2, and stored language data is inadequate for a particular subprocess to operate, it is argued that the activities proposed allow the new language data from the text to be processed and stored more effectively, developing language, and L2 reading fluency, and language awareness.